


this feels different than it felt before

by 2ne4 (17826)



Category: BBC Radio 1 RPF, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Coming Out, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Lovers to Friends, M/M, but its ok, if i was projecting any harder id be glowing, mostly ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-18
Updated: 2018-05-18
Packaged: 2019-05-08 15:58:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14697510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/17826/pseuds/2ne4
Summary: Hey baby saw you on the news,Lookin' like you ain't got much to lose.Now you feel you have enough to do.Come on baby, make me fall in love with you.Come on, please just make me tell the truth.- On The News by Keaton Henson





	this feels different than it felt before

**Author's Note:**

> title and summary quote from keaton henson , the song is deathly gorgeous and i cant recommend it enough
> 
> Content warning : there's a kiss in this which one party is significantly less up for than the other . it stops as soon as that is clear and is not a big deal for either character , but if that's something you find uncomfortable then here's your warning

"Nick?" Something shook him gently, and he opened half an eye, groggy. 03:52. What the fuck. "Nick, I've got to go grab some stuff from mine, I forgot something, I'll meet you at the station." A floorboard creaked and Nick realised his eyes had shut themselves without his noticing; dragging them open felt like they were heavier than, like, a heavy thing. 03:52, Jesus Christ.   
  
"Haz?" His voice was a croak, barely audible, but the lanky figure in the near-pitch darkness hesitated by the door. "What?" It tiptoed back to him as if there was anyone else in the house to wake up. A hand came to cup the nape of his neck, tucking into the covers.   
  
"Go back to sleep, I'm just gonna go grab my rings, left them in my other bag, I'll see you in a bit."   
  
The slightly blacker-than-the-room blob made it out the door before Nick's voice could be summoned from whatever deep place in which it lay thoroughly asleep, slurring reluctantly. "Have rings. Borrow 'em." A second after the rasp of his voice faded from the room, his alarm blared and he fumbled for it, annoyed.   
  
"You're not meant to go off for, like, an hour yet," he whispered, heartbroken.   
  
He finally got the button, and the face lit up, bright and cheerful and just the wrong side of a headache, 04:45.   
  
"What the fuck," he said aloud, because why not. What had Harry been saying? Going back to his house for, what, rings?   
  
"What the fuck," he allowed himself a final time, before groaning and pulling the covers off and zombie shuffling to the shower. He made it halfway before he recognised that the weird twinge in his stomach was nerves and not just his aged body protesting the early awakening.   
  
***   
  
"I thought he slept at yours last night? How can he be late? Why didn't he come in with you?" Fiona sounded slightly frantic, and Nick always forgot that this was her actual job too.   
  
"I told you, he left at fuck o'clock this morning, said he'd meet me here," Nick said quickly, wondering if Harry had actually slept at all. The spare room had look suspiciously unruffled this morning, as had the sofa. Over his headphones, George Ezra's voice faded out.   
  
"Good morning everybod-yy," he half-sang, practised enough to turn the frustration in his voice into a joke, "the time is 7 past 8, and, um, Harry Styles still isn't here yet. Dunno why, Fiona, have we heard from him?"   
  
"How should I know?" Her face obviously never got the memo to match the laugh in her voice. "You're the one who was meant to give him a lift in this morning."   
  
"Actually, he was meant to drive me, but he's still not turned up. I was almost late, waiting for that ride."   
  
"That's unlike him!"   
  
"I know, right? And people have been well on it with the texts about this, it's captured the nation's, well, frustration. From Nicole in Leeds, where is Harry? If he doesn't turn up soon, I'll be late for work 'cause I'm deffo not going in 'til he's been on! Dangerous strategy there Nicole, might lose your job over a right berk. Honestly, not worth it. Or I dunno, might hate your job, I can't tell you what to do. And, uhh, from Dan in Stevenage, do you know, if it's been more than 15 minutes and Harry Styles hasn't turned up, we're all allowed to go home! Right, if he doesn't turn up during this next song, let's all just go home, yeah? All of the UK, brought to a halt because of one tardy pop star. I could have a nap if we all went home though, I reckon Dan's got it. Okay, let's pop on some Sam Smith and then, maybe, go home!"   
  
He cued up the track, wincing at the moment of silence before it kicked in. _Get it together_ , he snapped at himself, unable to shake the feeling that Harry wasn't coming.   
  
"This is a first," Fiona said miserably, "letting down the Great British public. Twitter's exploding, Nick."   
  
Nick fired off another text, the 18th now - _Harry please reply_  - and checked his twitter mentions.   
  
"Fuckin' hell," he muttered, unable to scroll fast enough to keep up with the incomings from accounts all with names like @aroldstyles and @niallshairdryer. There were several long moments of silence, Sam Smith's voice barely registering in Nick's overloded mental diskspace.   
  
"Sorry, sorry," Harry's voice seemed to precede him into the room, despite the soundproof walls. He was out of breath, eyes wild, hair wilder.   
  
"Fuck, mate, are you okay?" Nick's voice was hollow as he stood, flapping his hands uselessly as an intern rushed Harry's mic positioning and handed him headphones.   
  
"Yeah, I'm sorry, here now," he looked so, so young. "Sorry-"   
  
"Stop apologising," Nick interrupted, aware that the song was drawing to an end, "do you want to go on?"   
  
Harry wouldn't meet his eyes and Nick reached across the desk for him without thinking. Harry's fingers came up to tangle in his, heavy rings reflecting the blue lights but he still didn't look up. Nick glanced at Fiona, at a total loss, cueing up a transition without looking, trying to buy time.   
  
"Harry?" She asked softly, the most caring she'd ever sounded, reaching towards him too, and this time he looked up as he took her hands with his free one. "Do you want to do this? We can improv something if you don't." Nick looked between them, neck going like he was at Wimbledon. The three of them were held there for a moment, hands clutched so tight that they had to lean towards each over the desk. Harry looked like he was being pulled apart between them. He nodded and Nick more or less jumped to the mic.   
  
"Bad news everyone," Nick tried to put a smile in his voice, and on his face, as Harry looked at him finally. "Harry Styles has arrived, we can no longer all take a day off, sorry Dan." He ignored the nerves in his stomach, knowing Harry's would be so much worse, and knowing it was going to be okay, or hoping at least.   
  
***   
  
20 minutes later, Nick dropped the faders on their mics and stood clumsily, just to get his face off the camera.   
  
"That was great," he said, and his voice sounded thin and fake even to his ears. He grasped for something to say. /Just be genuine, idiot/. "You did great, that, like, meant something proper."   
  
Harry had calmed down within seconds of going on air, and he would have looked perfectly at ease while he took off his headphones, except for that he once more wouldn't meet Nick's eyes and his smile never quite reached the corners of his mouth. He was already making to leave.

  
"I'll see you at home, yeah?" Nick asked lamely.   
  
"Yep," Harry said, popping the p. "See you there, bye Fiona, bye everyone." He was out the door before anyone could reply.   
  
"He's okay," Nick said, more to himself than as a response to Fiona's wide eyes. "He'll be fine."   
  
***   
  
Fiona let him leave almost immediately after Clara took over, and Nick had never put his long( _ish_ , his snide internal Rita corrected) legs to such good use as he did in speedwalking to his uber. As he came onto the street, the telltale click of cameras started up.   
  
"Harry with you, Grimmy?" Nick directed a withering look at that one before he could stop himself, though he supposed he was glad because it meant they'd missed Harry's actual escape.   
  
"Did you enjoy hosting Harry's coming out party, Grimmy?" Even for a paparazzo, this guy's voice was loud.   
  
"It wasn't a coming out party," Nick tossed back, "it was about supporting Diversity Role Models."   
  
"Did you know he was gay?"   
  
_He literally said the word bisexual live to the entire nation and yet here we are_ , Nick screamed, but only internally because he knew he shouldn't have even responded the first time. Luckily, his uber pulled up right in front of him and he hopped in gratefully.   
  
He'd known this was going to be annoying, but that didn't stop him from fuming all the way across London, glaring at the stupid buildings flashing past the stupid windows. As if something as antiquated and basically insignificant as a 'coming out' deserved a spot on the BBC Radio 1 breakfast show. As if Nick would let them put it on the roster if they tried. As if he'd been queering up the radio for as long as he had, just to let homophobic paps get to him. He shook himself, and took a few calming breaths. They were almost at his house, and he had honestly very little idea of what he'd say to Harry when he got there.   
  
In his lap, his phone buzzed up Niall's name on WhatsApp.   
_Hailee's got a photoshoot in central then I'm taking her for dinner, can I hide out at yours until then? x_   
Nick snorted, and double checked his memory. Yep, Niall had never been to his house before. He locked the screen without replying as they pulled up to his road.   
  
He thanked the driver and climbed out, fumbling his keys into the door. "Hello?" He called into the seemingly empty house.   
  
There was no telltale scrabble of claws, but as he toed off his shoes, Nick heard Jeff Buckley echoing through the floorboards, and he followed his ears to the sitting room, where he found Harry folded into the sofa, Pig cuddled into his stomach and Stinky sitting proud on his hips. He had obviously raided Nick's pyjamas, ditching whatever his stylist had put him in before for a stretched out grey t shirt that Nick was pretty sure had been Harry's originally, and some overpriced versace pyjama bottoms he'd given to Nick on his 30th. Nick couldn't help but smile.   
  
"Niall's offering cuddles under extremely false pretences," he said softly, "what do you want me to say?"   
  
Harry looked down at where his fingers were scritching Pig's ears, and she sighed in contentment. "Yeah, alright," he said, voice quiet.   
  
Nick nodded, though Harry wasn't looking, and shot back a reply with his new address. _Harry will be pleased to see you_ , he added honestly. He dumped his bag in the stairwell behind him and dropped his phone on the coffee table as he came to squat by Harry's head, hand resting on his forehead like he was a child trying to beg off school. His eyes were big and thankfully tearless as they met Nick's.   
  
"What was up with earlier?" He asked.   
  
To Harry's credit, he didn't look away. "I had to go back for my rings."   
  
"Why, love? I have accessories here, you could have borrowed." He stroked a thumb across Harry's temple. "Is my stuff really so shit?"   
  
"Definitely," Harry replied automatically, then grimaced. "I just needed the, like, the weight, they help me know when I'm performing. I didn't think I'd need them." His voice had gotten, impossibly, smaller.   
  
Obviously he wasn't going to get an explanation of why driving 20 minutes to pick up 6 rings had taken 3 and a half hours, so Nick stopped prying. "Well, this record's not helping," he said as Jeff Buckley's tortured voice span from the vinyl.   
  
"Everyone loves a bit of Grace," Harry said as he dislodged Stinky and pulled himself vertical, visibly making an effort to cheer up.   
  
"You're only playing this because you haven't worked out where I keep the records yet," Nick countered. Harry smiled sheepishly at that, and Nick's answering grin went someway to softening the set of Harry's eyes. Downstairs, his doorbell rang, sooner that it strictly should have from the assumption that Niall had been waiting for an invitation to turn up.   
  
"Put on the kettle, love," he said, patting Harry's knee as he stood and went to get the door.   
  
"Y'alright, mate?" Niall said cheerfully, stepping in as soon as the door opened.   
  
"Not bad, yourself?" Nick replied on rote, exchanging one of those weird, manly, slap-on-the-back hugs. They got on well, but they weren't exactly friends, and they both knew it.   
  
"Ah, can't complain," Niall said, hesitating uncertainly before yanking off his shoes.   
  
"Chuck 'em anywhere," Nick said, and led him up to the sitting room.   
  
"Salut chéri!" French accent flawless, Niall brushed past him to open his arms as Harry vaulted over the back of the sofa.   
  
"Ça va, darlin'," he grinned effortlessly, relaxing into Niall's embrace, tucking himself underneath as though he had ever been the shorter one.   
  
Nick smiled gently and deliberately didn't listen as Niall murmured something, instead turning to get the kettle that he could hear clicking off in the other room.   
  
When he got back, they were splayed out on the sofa, Niall's toes tucked under Harry's thigh. "There's nothing on TV, Nick," Harry whined, once again a teenager.   
  
"You got FIFA, mate?" Niall asked, looking around for a remote.   
  
"Niall, I am a flaming homosexual," he said flatly. Both of them burst out laughing, Harry much louder than he usually did when Nick made that joke. Something jealous and ugly flared in Nick's chest as he watched them lean on each other with easy familiarity, even now. _You have no right_ , he told himself, stern and knowingly futile. "Nadiya's season of bakeoff is up on Netflix, if you want."   
  
"Fuckin' ace," Niall grinned at Nick, and his chest loosened a bit. Niall was lovely, of course Harry was happy to see him. Nick was happy to see him, it was impossible not to be.   
  
"Best season," Harry said with gravitas, as though that wasn't the opinion that literally everyone had. Nick caught his eye and they smiled at each other, and if Harry's fidgeting hands kept just a bit too still, Nick didn't mention it.   
  
"I'm taking the dogs for a walk," he announced, as Harry pulled up Netflix. "Hobnobs are in the kitchen, I'll be back in an hour or so."   
  
"Have fun," Niall smiled.   
  
"Yeah, yeah," Nick replied, already out of the range of Harry's attention, "use protection, boys."   
  
  
  
A few hours later, once Nick had returned and Niall had left, with a firm promise from Harry to go golfing at some point and a flimsy promise from Nick to tag along and get pimms drunk with Hailee at the hotel bar, Nick and Harry found themselves leaning against the counters in the kitchen, waiting for the pasta water to boil. Rufus Wainwright played softly from Nick's fancy hidden speakers into the comfortable silence, a fact for which he was struggling not to judge himself; middle age was going to be the death of him, he reflected not for the first time.

  
"Pesto or carbanara?"   
  
He watched Harry's brow furrow slightly, really considering the options. "What kind of pasta?"   
  
_You're the sweetest thing in the world_ , Nick thought with unusual clarity. "Bows," he said, because he was always going to carry those kinds of thoughts to the grave.   
  
"Pesto, then. Got any parmesan?" He smiled wanly at Nick as he asked, looking more exhausted than he usually ever let show. "I would go check, but..."   
  
Nick's toes crossed the space between them to nudge against the fluffy pink slippers Harry had claimed at some point. "Big day, huh popstar?"   
  
"Something like that," Harry whispered, and Nick was suddenly horrified to see tears welling up. Oh God, he hated this, he had thought Niall had fixed it. _Buck up, Grimshaw_ , he told himself, because he clearly had no other choice.   
  
"Hey now, mate," he moved to lean against the counter next to Harry, hoping that no eye contact might pull this back to bearable. "What is it?"   
  
Harry's shoulders had folded in on themselves, and Nick always forgot how young he was, blinded by his stupid old soul. "It's dumb," he said wetly, "I shouldn't be like this, my mum accepts me, everyone's fine with it, or everyone that matters is, and I know it's not a big deal. So why was I so-" he cut himself off, tears falling in earnest now. "I shouldn't have been scared, Nick, what fucking example does that set?" He shook his head and scrubbed a hand under his nose, coming away snotty.   
  
"That's not how it works, Haz," Nick said quietly.   
  
"Yeah," Harry said, miserable, and his head dropped impossibly further, looking past his feet to the world below them, as if the floorboards were glass.   
  
"Oh, you daft sod," Nick said, aiming for fond indulgence and missing it by a mile, finding himself somewhere in the realm of aching, soul-deep love, as he so often did when it came to Harry Styles. He wrapped an arm round Harry's shoulder, and Harry buried his face in Nick's neck without hesitation, tears cold against his skin, entire body shaking silently.   
  
Only once in his life could Nick remember crying in front of someone. Properly crying, that is, not just sniffling over a movie. It had been an unremarkable day, a few weeks after Puppy had died, and he and Aimee had been chatting over coffee; he didn't now remember what set him off, he just remembers the desperate blinking and gulping of trying to hold it in, and how ashamed he'd been when he couldn't. Aimee, and Nick couldn't bless her soul enough for it, had handled it beautifully, letting him sob into her Prada skirt and then never bringing it up again. Harry was crying now the way Nick had then, and Nick had seen him cry before, but never like this. Shame sat badly on his face, contorting it in ways it wasn't used to, much more practised at joy. Nick didn't know what to do with this Harry.   
  
What he ended up doing a passable impression of his mum, if he was honest with himself. He murmured sweet nothings into Harry's ears, called him 'duck' and 'pet' and 'hun', hummed along to the music, stroked Harry's hair, _and_ managed to get the pasta on the go. Practically a domestic goddess. He led Harry round the kitchen with him as he gathered the bowls and cutlery, never losing contact, not that Harry would have let him if he tried. One by one, the sniffles got quieter.   
  
When the timer went, they separated so Nick could drain the pasta; behind him, he heard Harry fiddle with his phone, and Niall's album came playing over the speakers. He wasn't sure how to feel about that.   
  
They sat at the dining table to eat, something he usually only did when hosting a proper dinner party. Really, Nick could do without listening to one of the Radio 1 playlist albums, he thought sourly.   
  
"You should go on celebrity bake off," Harry said suddenly, conversational tone making his red eyes look out of place.   
  
"What?" Nick snorted. "No way, I'd be crap, embarrass myself in front of Paul Hollywood. I'd never recover!"   
  
"You'd be better than Alan Carr," Harry grinned, and there was something off about it.   
  
Nerves made themselves at home once more in the pit of his stomach. _Oh hello_ , he thought sarcastically, _it's been too long, must have been, what, 6 hours since we last met?_  "Probably, but what if I'm worse than Joey Essex? I really would have to remove myself from public life then."   
  
"You could come work for me," Harry said, and yep, he was definitely flirting, where the fuck was this coming from? "Could tidy the tour van for us between shows, could entertain the troops."   
  
"Skater skirt and all?" Nick didn't know what to do with the charming twinkle in Harry's eye, never having had it aimed at him before; it was the kind used to pull in expensive clubs, not the one that Harry got when he wasn't trying. That Nick could even tell them apart made him feel the full weight of nearly 6 years on his shoulders. "Thanks mate, I'd rather keep my current gig."   
  
"I could pay better," Harry almost purred, looking at Nick, somehow, through his lashes. The remains of tears in them should have ruined the effect, but of course they fucking didn't.   
  
Jesus. Nick shoveled pasta in his mouth so he had an excuse not to reply. What was he doing? What was Nick doing? What should he be doing? He'd never felt so out of his depth with Harry as he had today, and he kind of hated it. He ate quickly, then regretted it as he finished his bowl and Harry still had mouthfuls left.   
  
"Hungry, were we?" Harry grinned, and Nick made a non-commital noise. "Here," he said, spearing a piece of pasta and holding it out across the table to him.   
  
Their eyes held for a long moment, the fork hovering obscenely between them, like a metaphor in a gay European arts film. "Haz..." Nick said, voice hopeless.   
  
The fork dropped with a clatter as Harry stood and lent over the table, grabbing Nick's face and pulling their lips together roughly. There was the garlicy taste of pesto lingering in both their mouths, and Harry’s rings pressed uncomfortably into Nick’s cheeks. He remained strangely detached for a couple of seconds, getting a sense of events as if he was walking in on himself and Harry from the hallway. It didn't look like a good kiss.   
  
Harry made a desperate noise in his throat, and moved round the corner of the table without breaking the kiss, breathing against Nick's mouth as he repositioned him and straddled his lap, kissing him again and again, almost violently intense.   
  
Nick didn't kiss back. "Harry-" he tried to say, but his lips weren't allowed the freedom. He shoved a little at Harry's chest, bitterly aware of how on board with this he would have been two years ago. Harry didn't shift back at all, so he turned his head. "C'mon, mate, you don't want this," he said gently.   
  
"I do, I want you," Harry said quickly, finding Nick's mouth again and tangling his fingers into the collar of Nick's shirt, "I always want you."   
  
"That's a shit thing to say," Nick said honestly, shoving again, and this time Harry did sit back, though he didn't get off Nick's lap or relinquish his grip.   
  
Harry frowned. "Why?"   
  
_How long do we have_ , Nick thought angrily. "Because it's not true, and that's selfish."   
  
"How do you know it's not true?" Harry countered, matching the anger in Nick's voice, and that, inexplicably, calmed Nick more than anything else could have.   
  
"Because it can't be," he said honestly, hoping that if he laid out his hand for Harry to see, complete transparency, then he'd get the same in return. Everyone's cards on the table. "I can't go on living like this if it's true, pretending I'm okay with being just friends, picking guys to date that I know will break up with me because really I'm just filling the time until you get back from jetsetting across the world. I don't want to live like that."   
  
"Sounds like you have been," Harry said, stubbornly.   
  
"Yeah, it does," Nick agreed, and now Harry wouldn't meet his eyes. "So, it's not true."   
  
"But it was," Harry said, speaking to the place their thighs touched, voice muffled a bit by the tilt of his head.   
  
"Yeah, it was," Nick echoed. And the worst thing about that was that it was true, so true it was sometimes fucking unbearable. He shut his eyes and hugged Harry close. Harry's arms wrapped tight around his shoulders and they pressed together like they were trying to occupy the same space, uncomfortable as they fit themselves onto the one chair despite the half a dozen others within reach. This desperate need to be close was exhausting in its familiarity, in the way it never let up, not even when they'd been having sex every spare moment of the day, not even when they hadn't seen each other for 6 months. Nick had forgotten what it felt like to have a body that wasn't orbiting Harry. When they'd let their careers get in the way of their (potential, always potential) relationship, he'd assumed that eventually this physical craving would let up, but it had never even diminished; he had just got better at ignoring it. There was no question of that now, pressed together, around, between, into each other and still not satisfied.   
  
The miserable reality of it all was that everyone knew. He was ruined for anything else, anyone else, by whatever their brief (too brief, not brief enough) fling had been and everyone in the country could tell. Now all his friends were getting married and having kids and he loved Pig and Stinky, but- another thought that he couldn't finish if he didn't want to shatter in a million pieces. He couldn't stop the mental image flashing behind his eyes though, and there were dogs, yes, but a husband and children, too. He could hear the arguments in their London townhouse kitchen over the choice of primary schools, see the domesticity of a fridge covered in paper, could damn near feel the softness of the matching pyjamas they'd have got as a joke gift and would never admit to wearing. But the husband was his own age, still obscenely beautiful of course but more in Nick's league, maybe a photographer rather than a performer, maybe dark curls in more of an afro persuasion than Jagger-ish, or blonde, or shaved, or anything except soft brunette waves. Nick would be the one with the excess of tattoos, the breadwinner, but an equal in the relationship. _Where do you see yourself in five years time_ , and he'd always hated that question.   
  
But he wasn't as brittle now, years of practice building up a resistance until he felt like glass rather than ceramic; able to take a hit even if he'd lost some of the colour. The ability to reflect light was probably more useful to a radio host than a velvety surface was anyway, and maybe he was on his way to a diamond, one that could withstand a finished thought.   
  
He clung to Harry for a few minutes, until it was something that passed for bearable, if you stacked it on top of denial, stuffed them in a trenchcoat, and didn't look too close. By degrees, Nick's breathing evened out, and the jagged presence under his heart melted away. For all his proclaimed hatred of emotions, he'd know that this was gonna have to come up at some point, and now he'd had the conversation he was just relieved.   
  
"I'll do the dishes, you dry," Harry said, matter-of-factly, as he climbed off Nick and grabbed the bowls, shoveling the now-cold remains of his pasta into his mouth. Nick held himself still, consciously not reaching to pull him back onto his lap, then followed him to the sink where he watched as Harry removed his rings one by one, dropping them onto the hardwood counter right next to their discarded phones, and pulled on the rubber gloves. They sang along, both pitchy, to Niall's songs as they worked; Harry, it turned out, actually knew the words, and he grinned every time Nick got them wrong.   
  
Nick checked his phone when the last pot was put away, and ignored the number of messages that flashed up. It was still early enough, 19:17. "Want to watch a movie?"   
  
"Go on," Harry smiled, and somehow he already knew where to look for Nick's secret stash of popcorn. "What're the options?"   
  
"I'm thinking... How about Angus, Thongs, and Perfect Snogging?"   
  
"Never seen it, is it good?"   
  
"Never seen it?" Nick wasn't sure whether to be proud of how high his voice screeched in that moment, or just shocked. "Harold, it's a classic, you're going to love it. Baby Aaron Taylor-Johnson, are you kidding? Phwoar." God, he hoped Harry would be as infected by the mid-2000s teenage girl slang as he had been the first time he watched it.   
  
"Sounds perfect, Nicholas," Harry smiled, and there was none of that sharp tightness to his face now. "Lead the way."   
  
Nick made to do so, but Harry caught his elbow and pulled him back so Harry's forehead was resting against his shoulder and they were pressed back to chest.   
  
"I love you, Nick," he whispered, "I'm sorry."   
  
Nick knew what he meant. "Me too, Harry. Me too." He closed his eyes and lent his head back against Harry's. They held still for a second and ached, then they continued on their way.

**Author's Note:**

> why try n deal with my feelings about coming out when i could just turn them into fanfic instead haha SUCH fun
> 
> in case anyone was wondering , i made up the twitter handles i used in this story so any resemblance to persons real or fictional is entirely unintentional lol so if you have a handle like either of the ones i made up , feel free to let me know and i'll change em
> 
> please come and yell about gryles with me on Tumblr at [gricknimshaw](https://www.gricknimshaw.tumblr.com) i have SO many feelings about these kids
> 
> i literally live for comments pls any and all are appreciated even if its just an emoji or whatever . thanks 4 reading !


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